


a little here, a little there

by ms bricolage (onefootforward), onefootforward



Series: a hundred bits and baubles [1]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Pacific Rim Fusion, F/M, Multi, the fearsome threesome
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-19
Updated: 2014-12-27
Packaged: 2018-02-09 13:18:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 10,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1984425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/onefootforward/pseuds/ms%20bricolage, https://archiveofourown.org/users/onefootforward/pseuds/onefootforward
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>collection of things and stuff; mostly bellarke</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. here's to the future

**Author's Note:**

> pacific rim au; prompted by nothing more than ALIENS AND DRIFT COMPATIBILITY and yeah, okay

When Bellamy was just a kid, still obsessed with comic books and history class, and definitely not worried about the inevitability of global anarchy, his mother had sat him down and said, very earnestly, _life can turn on a dime my darling, and the only way you move forward is by not looking back._ She’d whispered it into his ear over peanut butter and toast, a half-hearted sentiment tucked into his backpack as he left for school, and yet it had always stuck with him through the years.

Mind you, she’d been talking about her own decisions at the time – another one of her clients had taken her ‘promises’ a little too seriously and they were skipping town, _again_. But still, he figures the principle of it doesn’t really change.

He tries to remember her after Miller dies. He thinks he knows her dark hair and thin lips, the harsh features that had made up her face, the surprisingly contrastive softness of her voice; he can’t recall the color of her eyes though, or how her hands had moved when she talked, _if_ they moved, or if she was like him and had to remain utterly composed when focusing all of her attention.

(All he can think of however are the last words on Miller’s lips as the Kaiju had clawed him out of their Jaeger, the feeling of losing your entire mind in one instance, of having reality torn from you in the same moment that your world falls apart.)

He doesn’t move after that. Losing the Arcas Minor and his drift partner in one blow is too much, was always going to be too much, and a man’s got to eat. So he stays near the crash site and he finds new work and he refuses to look back.

.

.

Marshall Griffin coming for him isn’t much of a surprise. The news reports are increasingly awful, though not entirely noticeable from the usual direness that is the last seven years of fighting and starving and dying, and he knows that the Jaeger program being shut down is _not_ something the woman would take lying down. He’s a trained pilot with a fairly good track record, and whatever, maybe the last few years of his career are all but non-existence, but Bellamy’s always been better as an underdog.

He still wakes up some nights with the memory of his body being crushed, the feeling of _dying_ , because being in someone’s head as they’re being eaten is pretty much the same thing as going through it yourself, with the added downside of living afterwards. He doesn’t tell the Marshall this, but he thinks she might know by the way she stands when she talks to him, asks him to come back and risk going through that again. The tilt of her lips, the cadence of her voice when she says _we’ll have to find you a new partner_ really pisses him off, makes the world turn to fire and ash.

But they still have Arcas. There’s still that.

And he doesn’t look back, he _won’t_ , he can’t compare _then_ to _now_ , but hell, at least he can choose what his view will be when the world ends.

.

(the blond-haired, blue-eyed whip of a woman who greets them when they land, says _welcome back mom_ , and _I imagined you differently_ has him rethinking the whole settling-for-the-apocalypse thing;

he doesn’t ask her what she thought he’d be like, only why she was thinking about him at all)

.

.

.

Seeing the Arcas again instills a terror within him he’s too prideful to admit to feeling, so he runs from it instead. Sure, now it’s got another arm, that’s fucking fantastic and all for this suicide mission of theirs, but all he sees is a disappearing body and the blue glow of a monster that he should never have thought dead.

In place of facing his fears, he seeks out little miss Clarke, princess of the Shuttledome. She fits her title well: soft-spoken, defers to authority, is one of the few official medics in this underfunded _rebellion_ (Bellamy scoffs every time someone mentions the title, like shit, what are they rebelling against, extinction?), but he knows better than to fall for her appearances.

Because Clarke Griffin? She’s a spitfire in a lab coat, an over-opinionated bossy know-it-all who never once looks at him with pity. She’s got a kill-count of forty-seven in the simulator, and if that doesn’t speak volumes about her, he doesn’t know what else to say.

.

Of course, she has no problem letting _him_ know what’s on her mind.

“You’re reckless,” she tells him, hands on his wrist, “and dangerous. It makes you a threat to the Kaiju’s, but it also makes you a threat to everyone else.”

He chuckles. “Is that supposed to make me feel bad about hitting Collins?”

“No, it’s supposed to make you rethink coming here.”

Somehow her critiquing him only ever uplifts his spirit, and his grin widens. “So I shouldn’t feel bad about hitting Collins?”

She punches him in the shoulder, which should really be off-limits seeing as she’s also currently treating the injuries on his knuckles. “That isn’t the point.”

“I think you’re avoiding telling me that it was the right choice to hit him.”

“Well I’m certainly not going to feed your ego.” She dabs the next cut more gently, so he doesn’t push it.

They’re quiet for a moment, Clarke fixing his hand and Bellamy staring at the top of her head, and he doesn’t need her to tell him _thanks_ or to somehow be grateful for defending her honour. Just like he feels no need to explain why he did it, or why he followed her into her room without a second thought after the fact, without any prior experience telling him that this was going to be normal.

(it is though)

She wraps the cuts, pushing the finished product back into his lap with a little bit more force than necessary, and he says, “We would be compatible.”

“What, like _drift_ compatible?” She looks at him. “That’s just, I mean it’s totally –“

“True.” He shrugs, leans back against her bedframe.

“I was going to say absurd.”

“Yeah, yeah, sure you were.”

She stares at him for an uneasy amount of time, fingers drumming against her knee. He already knows to feel wary when she squints at him, asks, “Why? Am I like your last partner?”

It’s kind of rude – actually, it’s _definitely_ rude, but most of all it’s just super _taboo_. Like, there are some unspoken rules between Jaeger pilots and that right there is the biggest one, because you don’t have a partner quit on you, or resign amicably, that’s not how the bond works.

He’s not surprised to feel the anger start to flame in his chest – he _is_ surprised to feel it directed at himself rather than Clarke. Because he promised not to look back, he _hates_ looking back, and yet…

“No,” he finds himself replying, “you’re nothing like him.”

“Is that bad?”

She doesn’t even have the decency to _pretend_ to be cautious about asking him. “You’re just different.” He shifts a little closer. “Like, Miller was way more self-focused than you are, didn’t meddle in my life or tell me what a shitty person I am. Also he never made stupid choices in friends.”

“Finn isn’t terrible _all_ the time, just around you and your massive ego. And his drift partner is super cool, which makes him bearable by association.”

“Clarke.”

“Besides, you just told me a few of my bad qualities, that’s terrible reasoning – “

“ _Clarke_.”

She glances away from him. “I’m not even a candidate.”

He _knows_ that, he’s been sparring with all of the fucking _awful_ ones all week. “You should be.”

When she looks back to him he’s close enough that he can see flecks of grey in the blue of her eyes, can see the moment her lips purse, probably swallowing another one of her heart-felt argument.

Instead she just leans closer, stutters Bellamy’s heart in its place and _fuck_ he hasn’t felt this in a long while, doesn’t know _what_ to feel at the sight of this woman he’s known for barely more than a week searching his face.

Whatever it is – whatever she finds – it works, because she sort of sits back a bit and nods. “Yeah, maybe I should.”

.

(She’s in the candidate lineup the next day, facing a frowning mother and a grinning Bellamy with eyes that betray nothing.)

(When they fight he feels alive, feels like the world isn’t running out underneath his feet, and her grin is all bared teeth and a smile that is more of a snarl and _fuck_ she’s perfect.)

.

.

.

So, of course, the first time they drift, things go _terribly._

He goes first, falling into the memories of Miller, of blood and terror and _aliens_ , of his mother’s lucrative pastimes, how he hasn’t seen his sister in seven years, hasn’t seen her smiling in eight.

Clarke’s quick to follow though, quick to show him a Kaiju through her five-year old eyes, her father dying trying to save her, everyone _dying_ trying to save her (her mind chants _Wells, Wells, Wells_ , and he doesn’t see anything, but he knows what it means). There are other images too, happier ones of small victories and her peaceful years at medical school, but like his own mind they are overshadowed by the horrors of this life.

As quick as he sees it, they’re forced out of it, left standing in their own little realities, and all Bellamy can think is how devastatingly _wrecked_ Clarke looks panting in the black armour suits.

She glances over at him with a smirk that says she knows exactly what he’s thinking (probably does, he realizes, probably knows every inappropriate thought he’s ever had) but then her lips soften out and he understands the question she doesn’t ask.

He nods. He’s okay – better than okay, actually. And from the way she’s looking at him, he thinks she’s okay too.

(Their second drift is hurried by chaos, entrenched in fear, but it’s one hundred percent abso-fucking-lutely perfect. He’s never felt more alive, never felt more comfortable in the knowledge that someone’s in his head, knows every thought before he thinks it, and that someone is a little blonde woman who draws fire from his veins and throws it right back to him;

She thinks Bellamy’s passion bottled in a body, more heart than head, more heart than _anything_ , still far too reckless and undisciplined, and she loves him the better for it.)

.

.

.

_—-coda_

When the fighting ends and disaster is averted, all he can think is that he’s done with the past, done with everything that came before this moment. He rests his forehead on Clarke’s, cards a hand through blonde hair shorn short, and he’s looking to the future.

And it looks like Clarke Griffin


	2. and then there's you

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There’s Bellamy and Raven, cop-bros for life, freaks in the sheets and all that, and then there’s Clarke; who knew that those blue polyester scrubs could be such a turn on?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fuck i don’t even know what i’m doing anymore (drabble status until further notice and/or procrastination)

The first time they meet, Raven’s covered in blood, Bellamy’s covered in badly disguised panic, and Clarke just plain  _has it covered_ . Which is definitely a huge relief in a hospital – competency is the only requirement Bellamy has for his doctors, although efficiency is absolutely a nice perk. Particularly when one considers how frequently he and his partner wind up in various derivations of _should have been a drug bust but turned out to be a weapons dealer_ .

Honestly, at this point the doctors should just recognize them on sight, usher them into the nearest sitting area, and sutra them up. Sometimes, if he’s lucky, that’s exactly what happens – Dr. Dixon, for example, while being morally ambiguous and an absolute pain in the ass, can have them in and out in under an hour. This time however, left staring in the wake of no less than three angry nurses and one homicidal receptionist, tucked into the only available private waiting room in the ER, Bellamy finds himself at the hands of the most obnoxiously thorough surgeon the hospital has to offer.

(He really shouldn’t have freaked out at the interns. Doctors had the weirdest pet peeves when it came to patients who yell at baby doctors.)

Clarke – no, wait,  _Dr. Griffin_  – stares down her nose at the two of them, blue eyes narrowed and annoyed in that tired way that only doctors can manage. She’s got a clipboard in her hand, which is more to say than the last time she stomped past their room, and jots down Raven’s health care information while simultaneously continuing to list off the longest running account of  _Why Police Officers Make the Worst Patients Ever_.

“This isn’t a precinct,” she grumbles onward, pen scratching softly as she checks off  _o neg_ , “and you can’t presume it operates under the same system as one.”

Bellamy hums some sort of disagreement, but Dr. Griffin is on a steamroll and refuses to be deterred.

“You always yell at the nurses. It’s disrespectful.”

“Some would argue that respect has to be earned.”

“Oh  _god_ ,” Clarke mutters, “you’re at a  _hospital_ , just – do you even _want_  Ms. Reyes to be helped, or do you just need the attention.”

An hour ago Dr. Griffin had been borderline polite. Or at the very least, she’d hidden her grievances a little more artfully.  

“They weren’t being very helpful.” He points out.

“ _Helpful_  – “ she bites back whatever scathing comment is on the tip of her tongue, “and  _what_  exactly did you want them to do? Tend to the two of you themselves?”

He slouches against the wall and twists his hands under his arms. “Would’ve been faster than trying to track any of your lot down.”

“My lot?”

Her voice is acerbic, and honestly, kind of a turn on. Bellamy grins. “Yeah, surgeons. Attendings. You’re always running after the trauma patients and ignoring everyone else you deem beneath your god-complex. Then you foist us off to the untrained masses.”

––strictly speaking, he’s aware this isn’t true; only, it’s fun to watch Clarke turn  _just_  enough so that he can see the incredulous disdain that seeps into her eyes and directs itself right at him, as if she could _literally_ smite him where he stands.

Raven shoots him an indecipherable look from her perch on the bed, brows furrowed in some vague semblance of  _not impressed_ , which, just, what a hypocrite, she’d made one of the tech guys cry last week after Bellamy had been pushed off the roof of a small building and the poor sap had gotten in her way.

“They were just doing their job, which, by the way, you seem to think is completely irrelevant. The interns have been trained, first of all, I’m not sure you’re aware that in order to even work here you need  _eight years of medical education_. Secondly,” Dr. Griffin replies, digging her pen further into the pad of paper, turning her back to Bellamy with a huff, “ _I’m_  not even an attending, so unless you want to spend another hour yelling at peons and trying to break into the OR I suggest you sit down and shut up.”

Bellamy does neither of those things – instead he settles for pushing himself off the wall and hovering over Dr. Griffin’s shoulder. Her writing is atrociously neat, even he can make out the  _pupil reactivity normal_  scribble from his vantage point.

“Clearly,” he drawls, his gaze flitting back up to the slope of her cheek, the red tinge a sure sign of anger rather than embarrassment, “An attending would be done by now.”

This time the glare Raven sends his way is exceedingly transparent – something along the lines of  _what the fuck are you doing dumbass_  – and Bellamy can’t quite blame her. The fear that had sprouted and taken root at the sight of Raven’s bloodied head has since stemmed, particularly once the good doc had declared it a superficial laceration ( _only_ , she’d said, like that made it better), and Bellamy’s not usually so belligerent when the medical shit’s been taken care of.

But, just…Clarke – fuck,  _Dr. Griffin_ , she’s a piece of work.

“You aren’t helping your case Mr. Blake.”

“Please,” he simpers, “call me officer.”

“ _Officer Blake_ ,” Clarke drops her clipboard on the adjacent table and reaches for the box of gloves, allowing a momentary glimpse of a caustically sweet smile, “I can have you forcibly removed from the premises.”

“Don’t go making promises you can’t keep.” He leers.

Raven’s been oddly quiet ever since she tried to peel back the wadded paper towel she had plastered to her forehead, and Clarke had directed her full attention back on her patient, chiding her gently while simultaneously exuding annoyed distaste for the entire event. Bellamy’s pretty sure he knows what’s gotten into her, something to do with big blue eyes and permanently downturned lips – besides, Raven’s an idiot who threw herself between a perp and a hard place, so her recent bout of reticence won’t be noticed.

Dr. Griffin leans down slightly, shifting herself to get the best angle possible to sew up Raven’s head wound, writing Bellamy off with barely more than drawn out exhale, and he takes in the resulting view with  _great_  appreciation.

Oh yeah. They’re  _totally_  making an even bigger fuss the next time.

.

.

.

They have extremely dirty, drawn out,  _hot_  sex that night, Raven’s penchant for running a foul mouth after a shift compounded by the desperate whine in Bellamy’s throat – every time he so much glimpses the stitches on her forehead he loses it, thrusts harder and deeper and tugs at Raven’s legs until they’re wrapped firmly around him, the two of them joined so closely together that he loses track of where one ends and the other begins. They meet in the middle for needy, messy kisses – more a rough clacking of teeth and tongue than anything else – and bring each other over the edge again and again.

Once they’re totally spent, limbs tangled in the sheets and breath heavy as they pant into each other’s skin, Raven rather needlessly confesses, “She was  _so_  fucking hot.”

Bellamy grins.


	3. blood and moonshine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> bellarke; because I kind of always am in need of worried Bellamy and sassy Clarke

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this was my 100th post on tumblr! which of course meant it should be about the 100. help. i’m obsessed. 
> 
> kinda inspired by that whole ‘Bellamy inspires the masses and Clarke inspires Bellamy’ thing, kinda inspired by all the talk of future!bellarke, kinda inspired by my perpetual obsession with fictional worlds.

" _Fuck_ , stop squirming - "

“I’m not – “

“You are.”

“Am  _not._ You’ve just got shitty hands.”

“Shitty  _–_ ,” Bellamy leans forward, nudging her hip with his elbow, “what does that even mean?”

Clarke’s underneath him, hands balled into fists and crossed in front of her. “Means I thought your mother was a seamstress, why do you suck at this so much?”

He pulls the needle through the flap of skin, tightens it as best he can while listening to Clarke whimper – it’s a balance, a fine line he’s toeing at the moment.

“’Cause this is your forte, remember princess?” She grunts and he tugs the wound back into place, straightens the stitches. “I go do the war things, and you fix the mess.”

“You make us sound like a – “ she pauses here, taking a deep breath, and he  _knew_  he should have forced her to have some moonshine before this whole thing, “ – an old married couple.”

“I was thinking two sides of the coin or something a little more poetic, but hey, if you want me that bad…”

She makes to turn over then, probably to give him shit or to tell him to put his ego right back where he found it, thank you very much, but he presses his knees more tightly to her sides, keeps her in place. “Clarke,  _seriously_ , stop moving.”

She stills – doesn’t stop the, “You’re so full of shit Bellamy Blake,” that tumbles out of her mouth.

They’re in their room,  _his_  room, technically, but she doesn’t really ever bother getting her own these days, Clarke laid out on the shitty excuse of a mattress, and Bellamy on top of her. There are about a hundred other scenarios that he’s imagined involving this position, several of those involving the small little noises she keeps making whenever he shifts, and absolutely none of which include his hands covered in her blood.

(and moonshine, she reminded him, when he’d first started grumbling, blood and moonshine;

– that should be their camp motto at this point,  _fuck_ )

But no, Clarke had to go try and be a hero, forgetting that she was like five feet tall and barely over a hundred pounds sopping wet, and put herself under a falling kid and the ground. Technically it was the scrap metal that had done all the damage, one of the pieces they’d pulled aside from the junk yard as a possible weapon, but Bellamy likes to blame sheer stupidity for the fact that he is currently straddling their only medic, sowing up her back.

“Don’t give me a scar just because you’re too scared to take me seriously.”

He glares at the back of her head. “Take you seriously?”

Clarke wiggles her toes, probably trying to resist turning her head. “The more stitches the better – it’ll heal nice.”

(she’s already got too many in a back her size, he thinks, but doesn’t say anything)

“And if you scar me, how am I ever going to find a husband?” She continues, huffing dramatically, and  _fuck her_ , it works, because he chuckles.

He pulls another line through. “We’ll just drop you off with the Valley people, I’m sure they’ll set you up with a nice match.”

She snickers, then groans, because  _back injury_. “Right, good to know I have options.”

“Gods know you’re going to be too repugnant for any of us.”

“Oh definitely.”

It’s silent then, so he focuses on looping the thread through evenly, because Clarke’s right, his mother  _was_  a seamstress and he’s picked up on a few things trying to keep everyone alive over the years. It’s a soothing sort of quiet, even with her blood on his hands, so when he ties off the final stitch and cuts the thread, he doesn’t move right away.

(She’s breathing steadily beneath him, conveying a subtle sort of safety he hadn’t been assured of a few hours ago, when she’d pulled him aside with blood dripping down her back and asked him  _could use some help, y’know, if you have a minute to spare_  and it’s easy to get lost in that rhythm.)

He splays his fingers over the sides of her ribs and frowns. “How much are you eating?”

She inhales slowly. “Same as everyone else.”

“Clarke…”

“Bellamy.” She replies, then wriggles her hips. It’s a request to move, he knows, but it’s also the type of wrong that feels right, with her body underneath his like that, and –

He moves.

She turns slowly, resting her weight on one arm as she pulls her top down, which is really fucking useless because the shirt’s torn to shit anyway. It makes Clarke feel better though, because by the time she’s leaning back on both hands she’s grinning up at him.

“See, that wasn’t too bad…” she trails off when her eyes drift over his, “what’s wrong?”

His jaw clenches, and he can’t get the image of her soaked in blood out of his head. Which is  _stupid_ , it isn’t the first time, hardly is going to be the last, not when she’s got a savior-complex the size of fucking Neptune.

Yet he can’t help but catch her gaze and feel the steel in his fists crumble a bit. “You can’t  _do_  shit like that Clarke.”

“What? Not eating? I’m not an idiot Bellamy, I take the same as everyone else – “

“No.” He shifts so his knees touch hers, both of them sitting cross-legged in front of the other. “No, you can’t throw yourself under a fucking  _grown ass man_  when he’s falling off a building!”

If she’s shocked by him yelling she doesn’t show it, only blinks at him slowly and scowls a little. Gods know if she was going to be annoyed by him raising his voice at her, she’d have left a long while ago. “He was going to hurt himself.”

“Tristan is eighteen and responsible for his own stupidity.”

“He just broke up with Cedar, he was  _upset_.”

Bellamy leans forward. “He was drinking during a shift. He was reckless.”

“ _Care_ less, maybe – “

“There aren’t any  _maybes_  when your safety is involved.” He grabs at her knee, the rough fabric hot under his hand. “You can’t do that again.”

“What,” she doesn’t brush him off, but her frown deepens, “get injured, or do something you don’t approve of?”

 _Both_ , he wants to say, but they’ve been doing the leadership thing for a few years now, he knows that neither answer is the right one. “Be reckless.”

Whatever she sees in his eyes must be enough, because rather than dole out whatever smart ass remark is on her tongue, and he knows she has one, she’d be on her deathbed and still have one, Clarke lays her hand over his and laces their fingers together.

“Yeah, okay.”

Bellamy turns their hands, palm to palm. “Okay?”

“Well, I’ll try.”

“ _Princess_.”

She laughs then, and doesn’t tug her hand away, so he lets it go. A lot of their partnership is about this type of compromise, neither of them really bending in their ways, only respecting the other enough to see the different perspective, or to at least accept that it’s a thing that’s about to happen and there is shit to change about it.

She glances down at their hands. “We are going to have to do something about Tristan though.”

“Banning his alcohol privileges should be fine.”

Clarke smirks. “No, I mean about him and Cedar. He’s really upset, wouldn’t stop blubbering about it in between apologies for landing on me.”

“Good to see he’s so worked up on nearly killing the medic.” She narrows her eyes, but it lacks any heat, and he continues. “Actually I heard that Cedar thinks she’s in love with the guy.”

“ _What_ , then why did she – “

“Apparently this is all some sort of mix up caused by Tammy and that last river we passed?” When Clarke only shakes her head, a smile tucked somewhere in her disbelief, Bellamy shrugs. “Whatever the case, clearly we can’t just let them keep going on this way. I’ll talk to Cedar in the morning.”

“Yeah, okay.” She bites her lip, grinning, as if trying to hold in the next, remark. “Mother hen.”

Bellamy chuckles, but it’s kinda  _true_ , so he doesn’t actually say anything, only uses their entwined hands to tug Clarke into his lap. She follows without much complaint, especially since he’s careful to keep all weight off her stitches, and when he leans back into the bed she doesn’t protest curling up on the side of his chest. He doesn’t bother to try and unlace her boots, or even grapple for the blankets that are pooled somewhere beneath them, because  _fuck it_ , he’s comfortable.

He cards a hand through her hair and tucks her under his chin, she feels both small and powerful slipped next to him, which makes his next thought twice as ridiculous.

“Does that make you the father then?”

She laughs. “Yeah.” Turns over a little and closes her eyes with a sigh. “Someone’s got to keep the peace.”

“Right,” he agrees, “you keep everyone alive, and I keep everyone safe.”

The whole ordeal must’ve taken more out of her than she admits, because she’s practically passed out on his chest. Still manages to whisper a happy little, “Deal,” before nudging her – ridiculously cold – nose into his shoulder.

Their names are the only promise he needs anyway; it’s a mantra that has followed them from drop ship to west coast, and honestly it sounds a lot better to him than  _blood and fucking moonshine_. Him and Clarke. Invincible leaders.

(or at least, he thinks, watching her fall into sleep, that’s how he feels when he looks at her looking at him)


	4. fool me thrice, shame on no one

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clarke would make a shitty parent. No, really, she’s got a head for numbers and a heart for really, really bad puns. Kids don’t fit anywhere in there. Yet somehow she’s still stuck in the role of “yes honey your weird-ass crayola drawing does look like a dinosaur, thanks, the glitter is a great addition, really,”
> 
> So, y’know, the usual. Counting down the days until she can get “father-dearest” back and foist off the little ones.
> 
> (Seriously. Has anyone seen Bellamy? Fey keeps trying to give her bejeweled rocks and Bellamy definitely likes sparkly things more than her.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so I watched the premier, and I was going to write this alternating pov between Raven, Bellamy, and Clarke, because dude, did you see their disgustingly attractive pissed-off faces this ep? It was going to be in essence a rotating series of disgustingly attractive pissed-off-ness and a big turn on tbh. But then I realized that tonight is the first night in weeks that I don’t have to stay up late and cram shenanigans into my head, so instead have a snippet?? it’s dumb. I’m dumb. blame it on expensive education.

“What,” she frowns, “the fuck,” an eyebrow furrow, tossed in for good measure, “is  _that_ .”

It isn’t really a question, except it  _is_ , because Clarke’s expecting an answer. Just, she isn’t expecting it to be a good one.

“An etch-a-sketch!” Monty shouts – like literally  _shouts_ , what, why – and pulls her down onto the bed next to him. “It’s like uhm, a sketchpad that you never need to replace, only you can pretty much just draw with those two dials there, and also the left half of the screen doesn’t work for some reason.”

She frowns some more. Monty follows suit.

“Well,” he says eventually, after the two have sat on his bunk for a long moment of contemplation, “I’m sure I can fix that.”

She nods and says, slowly, “I’m sure you can.”

They stare at it some more. It’s strange, and also kind of an unwelcome insight into pre-apocalyptic humanity and what was evidently classified as The Utmost Important Pieces of Culture: Item 352/t; the Etch-A-Sketch.

( _Why_ , Clarke thinks,  _of all the things you could have brought with you, why?_ )

Eventually Clarke realizes that Monty’s actually offering her the weird dullish-red piece of machinery, so she takes it from him and tries for a smile, “Ah…thanks?”

His grin returns full force – as does the shouting. “Great!” He pats her on the back, “I’m so happy you’re adjusting.”

She blinks. “I…am?”

She’d actually been in the middle of making supplementary battle plans – the backup versions, in case the first two didn’t work out – when Monty had stormed into the otherwise deserted dorm rooms. They’re the conditional preparation she’d been drawing up in her spare time, in case the initial seven escape plans go poorly. What can she say, Bellamy wore off on her.

It’s probably good that she doesn’t actually say any of that though, because the moment she agrees Monty immediately pulls her in for a hug.

“Yeah,” he huffs, right into her ear and  _oh god_  is he going to cry, “it’s so great to have you here Clarke. We all really missed you.”

She takes the embrace with all she’s got (which is  _nothing_ , absolutely nothing at all, what is this whole conversation even) and replies with a generic hum of agreement that is the best lie she can pull of in this particular moment.

“Well,” she says finally, “I’m here now.”

Which, it’s  _true_.

“We made it,” he says, and pulls back. Clarke doesn’t have it in her to argue, for the third time this week at least, that just because Dante isn’t actively attacking them doesn’t mean he is necessarily all about helping them either. It hasn’t worked yet. Hence – conditional plans.

Still – she can’t help but grab his shoulders in a moment of, well, characteristic seriousness, and say, very sternly, “You know I’ll never go anywhere without you guys, right?”

 “Yeah, yeah, of course.”

“Okay,” oh god, now she’s getting emotional, “good. As long as you know.”

“I do.”

“Alright. And everyone else knows that too.”

“We do,” Monty says, and gives her another quick side-hug.

It’s moments like these that she really misses Bellamy – not only was he a lot better at this pseudo-parenting stuff than she was, but he also had the additional bonus feature of taking some of the weight of the children’s expectations off her back.

The gifts – because the etch-a-sketch isn’t actually the first weird token thing she’s been presented with this week, this  _day_  even – are some manifestation of that. A hyperpolarized family whose motto is likely  _those who kill together share their weird obsession with knick-knacks…together_ ,

Monty stands up and offers, “You want to go steal some dessert with me and Jas?”

Clarke laughs, “As tempting as that offer  _is_ , I think maybe I’ll stay here and uh – check out my new sketchpad.”

She holds up the  _thing_  and Monty lights up like she just gave him an award or something.

Maybe there’s a group-wide competition going on? Like, “what inane object can we get Clarke to smile and accept today?”

“Yeah, good, that sounds good,” he says, and scampers off.

In the silence after she considers the machine. It’s mostly useless,  _but_  you never know. Maybe they could get really good at it and put secret messages on it or something. Y’know, when everyone else realizes that Mt. Weather reeks strongly of Ark 2.0, but with like, less power failures, and wants to actually escape  _with_  her. She’s planning on that moment being on a Tuesday, ideally, because that’s when the weekly guards rotate area shifts.

Oh – speaking of. She reaches under the bunk and pulls out her actual sketchpad, the one that Dante had given her in some pseudo-show of comradery, as well as the pencil she keeps hidden in underwire of her bra – they provide a dual functionality of drawing  _and_  stabbing. She looks at the blank page and grins.

Escape Plan #17 is going to involve  _pie_.

(and yeah, okay, also the etch-a-sketch)


	5. fool me thrice, shame on no one (again)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was going to write an equally ridiculous one from bellamy’s pov, but bellamy is too angry?? and also all the kids are with clarke, and he’s stuck with raven, who’s cool but sort of out-of-action for a while, and finn, who’s dumb, it’s his fucking fault they went went with the ark in the first place, and also, why didn’t he say anything at all about why bellamy, perfectly reasonably, beat up murphy?? finn?? c’mon man, all it would’ve taken was a quick “oh by the way murphy is (a) a big dick, (b) psychotic, and (c) a child-killer.” like OH it’s as easy as that.
> 
> /rant
> 
> But yeah it was going to be that, but then i decided that bellamy is perpetually angry. also he sometimes sounds a little more poetic than clarke but that’s only because clarke’s just kind of wait what and generally is too literal??? while bellamy is more ‘read through the social contract and the manifesto by the time he was ten, so he started in on Lenin and Trotsky’, so obv they think a little differently.

It isn’t really like he meant to say it - to fall out of his mouth like so many lives lost, each snide remark another bullet in the brief history of his people. _His_  people, god damnit.

But that was the thing, this  _whole fucking situation_. He didn’t mean for it to happen, but it did anyway.

“ _What_  did you say to me?”

Bellamy shrugs. “You heard me.”

Abby steps forward, right into his personal space, and it’s uncomfortably close especially since Bellamy’s pretty certain he hates the counsilwoman, like, honestly, in a  _makes him feel so slimey ew get your nasty elitist ass away from me_ way. She does however manage a pretty good show of towering over him despite being a fair bit shorter, and he wants to say  _so that’s where princess gets it from_  or  _that look is much more attractive on your daughter_ , but he’s robbed of the opportunity.

"You are nothing more than an egotistical  _criminal_ who’s been running a camp of children like some sort of…of  _war lord_.” She hisses, face flushed, “it’s no wonder so many of the kids died - no, what’s really impressive is that not all of them  _did_!”

He doesn’t flinch at this comment - he  _doesn’t_ , but a weight settles in the pit of his stomach, a steady whisper of  _your mother would hate the man you’ve become_.

Instead he grins, licks his lips and says, “War lord? Oh, I like that one.”

She utters a wordless shriek, the only thing so far that he’s enjoyed hearing come out of her mouth, and storms away - one last furious glare thrown his way just for the heck of it, or maybe she just can’t say anything more without seeming like a hysterical mother, when really she’s supposed to be second-in-command. Or something to that effect.

Bellamy stares after her as she leaves and thinks,  _god no wonder Clarke didn’t want to talk to you, you’re literally a five-year old child, what the fuck_.

It’s a weird reversal, to flip from being responsible for so many to having all his authority ripped from him in one fell crash landing. It reminds him of swapping between parenting Octavia and then going to act as the lowest guard in the rung of an impossible ladder, which just makes him really fucking annoyed to think about, so he huffs and stomps away.

Whatever. He’s allowed to be petulant, it  _doesn’t fucking matter_. No one’s looking up to him, except maybe Skywalker, but that’s a really big maybe, and anyway, Bellamy doesn’t  _care_  if Collins respects him or not, Collins is  _fucking stupid_.

He flips open the curtain to the chambers and is greeted by Raven’s snide, “What the hell was that about asshole?”

He hadn’t been aware they’d been that loud. With a snort he tosses himself into a nearby sham of a chair and says, “ _What._ ”

"Abby doesn’t scream at people,"

"That," he says, "is obviously not true."

Raven pushes herself up a little further on the cot and scowls, “That’s my point dumbass.”

With Raven it’s practically a term of endearment. Bellamy feels his face relax somewhat, though his frown doesn’t let up.

"She’s a fucking bitch," he says instead.

She tosses a pillow at him. “Take that back.”

"No."

"Bellamy."

"Well she  _is_  Raven,” he says - not shouts, he’s  _not shouting okay_ , his voice is just normally this loud, “she’s a bitch, and even Clarke knew that.”

His knuckles are white as they grasp at the pillow, twisting the fabric back and forth. Not that he’s worried about ruining it, he’d traded rations for the stupid fucking thing, so it’s  _his_ , and it’s a shitty  _Ark_  pillow anyway, they don’t hold up worth shit.

They hadn’t  _explicity_ told him not to crash here, but Abby had made some pointed statement about patients and their need for proper care and rest, so Bellamy had spent the next day scrounging up enough of a bed to bring with him, and now he, Finn, and Raven possess the weirdest pow-wow of a room in the old Ark-parts. He toes the edge of Raven’s cot as she stares at him for several minutes, firmly  _not sulking_.

"You said something about Clarke to her," Raven accuses, her voice stupidly calm, "that’s the only reason Abby would lose her cool like that."

Bellamy doesn’t say anything back, which, fuck - just gives it away.

"You shouldn’t provoke her like that Bellamy."

"She’s not some fucking idol Raven," he retorts, irritated.

They’ve had this conversation before though, so Raven holds back whatever reply she normally chooses, usually some derivation of how pointedly  _Not Bad_ Abby is, how much she loves her daughter or whatever. But like, Bellamy’s pretty sure that her daughter doesn’t reciprocate the feeling, and if he didn’t already feel smarmy just  _talking_  to any of the counsil members then the mere fact that Clarke was still in a fight with her mother would be enough for him to hate her. Just, on principle.

Clarke was part of the original one hundred, and sure, mostly she was a pain in the ass, but she was  _his_  pain in the ass, all of them were  _his_ , he was going to get them all fucking back and Counsilwoman Griffin could just fuck right off.

He glances back at Raven who’s not quite glaring at him, but doing some close approximation, and sighs - they’re  _all_  pains in his ass, but he was responsible for every last one of them.  _Is_  responsible for every last one of them. The rest were absolutely somewhere, alive, and probably in deep shit and it is  _killing him_   _to be here_.

"How’re your feet?" He asks, and Raven blinks at him.

She turns and shoves her legs forward a bit, enough so that her toes peep out from under the covers. They wiggle, but slowly. “Okay,” she admits, “but not quite running material yet.”

She’s no longer glaring at him, choosing instead to glare at her legs. Bellamy heaves a deep exhale and slides forward, bringing his hand up to cup Raven’s shoulder.

She twists back to him and he says, “They’ll get better.”

Normally he doesn’t do false comfort, but well, it’s  _true_ , he’s willed it that way and now it’s true. Obviously. Also the shit medic-assistant assured them that Raven was in fact on her way to recovery, but really it’s Bellamy’s stout refusal to have Raven crap out on him that’s got her pushing the healing time.

"Yeah," she agrees, but her voice wobbles. Only a little bit, because Raven is a pain but she’s also a god damn badass who doesn’t take anyone’s shit, which Bellamy really respects in an individual.

Except the counsil. He fucking hates that quality when it comes to Miss Classist and her gang, but only because they’re  _arrogant dickwads with the entire solar system shoved up their asses along with their heads_  and he’s the last person to complain about ego, but  _fuck_ , they’re so  _fucking shitty_.

“ _God_ ,” he sighs, his head collapsing into the crook of Raven’s elbow, “we have _got_  to get out of here.”

She pats his head, and it’s a little awkward because he’s pinning the other arm but it’s also sort of soothing so he remains where he is, face buried in scratchy comforter and rough skin.

"Soon," she says, and it sounds like a promise.


	6. let's talk about domesticity

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WHAT.
> 
> (for the few of you who have bookmarked this and are getting 10+ updates: sorry)

“No,”

“But why  _not_  – “

“Because,” she says, lifting her gaze from the map in front of her, “I said so. And because it’s a ridiculous idea, we don’t  _need_  anything from there.”

Tin – little kid, barely up to Clarke’s shoulder yet made of pure rebellion and precocious ingenuity – frowns and crosses his arms. “That’s not what Bellamy said.”

She feels her eye twitch – habit. “What does that mean?”

“Bellamy said,” Tin huffs, his voice getting louder as he gets more defensive, “he said that  _culture is important_  and that we need uh, we need to honour ours if we want to…if we want to commit to – “

“Commit to ourselves?” Clarke guesses with a raised brow, “If we want to stand as independent authorities in this new world?”

It’s a popular Bellamy line, honestly, and he’d run it by her just last night when they’d been fighting over –

“Tin,” she asks slowly, “Bellamy wouldn’t have put you up to this, would he?”

Tin shakes his head quickly, and Clarke has to muffle her groan.

What a shit.

She puts the map down on a nearby rock and kneels so she’s a little below Tin-height. She tries hard not to frown but she’s never really mastered the ‘mom face’ and she ends up half-scowling instead, which doesn’t make Tin look any more at ease.

“What did he promise you?”

Tin toes the dirt, “Nuthin’,”

“Tin,”

“He  _didn’t_. He asked.”

She is not going to fall for this, she is  _not_.

“And what do you think about the plan?” she asks, and when his eyes light up she adds on, “ _honesty_ , Tin, don’t even try to lie for him.”

Tin’s got this really beautiful dark skin that reminds her of Wells, and bright, blue eyes that remind her of the infants in the med bay back on the A.R.K., and he’s the third youngest in the camp so she’s really setting herself up for failure but she trails down the rabbit hole anyway.

“Uhm,” he pauses, eyes flickering off to the side – a lip disappears under his teeth, which  _good_ , they should take this seriously, “well, Mama used to say that having people was just as important as having food and clean water,” Clarke smiles, “and I think that havin’ a group culture would be just like havin’ a way to group all our people together.”

She nods, “That’s a very good point,”

Damn it.

“But it’s dangerous to go.” She’s sure to add, “And we don’t know what’s out there.”

“Bellamy says we could bring some of the Grounders, ‘cause they know where they’re goin’.”

She mutters, “of  _course_  he did” because they had  _just had this exact conversation_ , like barely twenty-four hours ago, and Clarke had still been yelling counter-arguments while she’d set up their tent and stripped off the grimiest layers of her clothes, pointing out the  _perfectly logical dangers_  of running headfirst into unknown territory for shit like books and new clothing and –

Well. She’d essentially argued her way into bed, fallen asleep with protests on her lips and Bellamy whispering things about  _starting a clan here Clarke_ , and _we need to be serious about it_  into her ear even as she drifted off, and really, she should have known that that wouldn’t be the end of it.

“The Grounders might not want to go,” she points out, because while some of Anya’s gang are still travelling with them – and apparently will be for the foreseeable future – they aren’t exactly the easiest folk to smooth into the folds.

But. Well, they’re pretty loyal to Clarke which – bonus. And weird. So, so weird.

“They would if you asked ‘em.” Tin argues.

She grins at him, “You don’t happen to be reading my mind right now, do you?”

He laughs. It’s… _damnit_ , it’s heart-warming.

 _Fuck_ , she’s  _so_  bringing this up the next time Bell gets huffy with her when she decides to go on the big hunt.

But she knows a lost cause when she sees one – she’s the lost cause, just a side-note here – and resigns herself to giving in almost before Tin asks again, “So can we go?”

“Let me go talk to Amos and Ruth first.”

“They’ll say yes,” he quips, and before she knows it he’s grabbed her map and folded in back up, tugs at her hand until she’s standing and continues, “they like you.”

She starts walking. She’s such a pushover,  _jesus_.

“They think I saved them. It’s not that they like me, they…respect me I guess,”

Tin glances up at her, hand still in hers, and she forgets sometimes that she’s talking to a thirteen year-old.

He’s shaking his head, “No, they definitely like you. I heard one of ‘em say so to Munroe – she said you were a uh… _wyra kunk_ ,”

“Oh,” Clarke deadpans, “in that case.”

“It means warrior queen!” Tin chirps.

She doesn’t – she  _refuses_  to ask, because otherwise she’ll get started on like, possible infiltration schemes if they understood how to speak the local dialects, or oh, how  _handy_  would that be when they come across another bastard clan like the Kl’otka –

Tin’s leading her back to the main area of camp, and thankfully it is Jasper’s voice which interrupts her thoughts and not someone else’s. Clarke finds it very difficult to get mad at Jasper, or to push him too hard, especially after the train-wreck of a guilt marathon they’d had to endure after Mt. Weather.

“Clarke!” he shouts, and takes in Tin’s hand in hers –  _what_ , so sue her, she’s a big fucking sap, “ _awesome_ , I’ll just go tell Bellamy – “

“Oh no,” she interrupts, and she hopes her smile is as malicious as she feels, “please, let me,”

She slides her hand out of Tin’s and strides past Jasper, some sort of protest still on his lips – Bellamy’s on some mass canvas-creation duty today, she knows exactly where to find him, already is envisioning where she’ll pull him away to so that she can tell him exactly what type of underhanded _manipulation_  this is and doesn’t he know that it isn’t nice to use the kids to force her to see the voice of reason and –

Okay, honestly, they’ll probably start making out sometime after that. But – first she’s going to yell at him.

Hey, priorities, right? 


	7. it's terribly to see you

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> points:  
> >> i can’t seem to stop doing these, and i definitely am not sorry  
> >> neither can i stop from writing clarke as a swearing fiend — still not sorry  
> >> when clarke and bellamy do eventually find each other, i imagine it to be in the middle of some big shit show, like “oh great, it’s awesome to see you bellamy, but could you please move a little to the left i need to shoot a bitch,”  
> >> that bitch will be one of the mountain men (or women)  
> >> as such they will not (a) embrace each other dramatically, (b) profess their undying i really don’t hate you sorry about all the yelling, or (c) realize they’re deeply/madly/truly/whatever in love with the other one  
> >> not that i wouldn’t love that. but.  
> >> also i one day want to write the background to the line 'and once, briefly, a sweater' which might make sense if you make the (probably terrible) decision to continue reading this

She hadn’t exactly been picturing this… _sentimental_  reunion, because while her and Bellamy shared a lot of things in the time before the dropship explosion (see: quarantined area, immeasurable responsibilities, and once, briefly, a sweater), fond feelings weren’t often among them. Even when she’d _liked_  Bellamy she’d still held a brief bit of annoyance for, well, pretty much everything their situation forced them to be.

Still. She wasn’t expecting smiles and embraces and cheesy lines, but she certainly hadn’t been expecting the first words out of his mouth to be, “What the  _fuck_ ,”

Clarke stares. And stares some more. “Bellamy?”

The tree behind him shakes and out pops Monroe, followed by Murphy - wait, why  _Murphy_ , and then  _Finn_  —

But Bellamy, bloodied and frowning and totally ignoring the  _moment_ , goes, “Clarke, what is  _this_?”

"Uhm," she glances behind her, "this is…everyone? You’ve definitely met before?"

“ _Not_  my point,”

She follows his line of sight to the haggard bunch of Grounders limping off to the side — they hadn’t outright  _refused_  to intermingle with the other forty-eight teenagers, they’d just implicitly avoided them — and matches his scowl. “What.”

She turns back around and can’t help but drink in the sight — everyone is covered in grime and different shades of injuries, shit, what do they do when she’s not here, just  _ignore_  basic hygiene — idiots — but they’re  _here_  and not…they haven’t been dissolved, or singed alive, or irreparably damaged, it’s. It’s a sight.

Well, Bellamy’s still got the look of murder on his face, or at the very least murderous  _resignation_ , she thinks hopefully, so there’s that.

They’re alive, alive, alive

, her heart pulses.  _What a shit, shit, shit,_  her brain responds.

He glares, “I leave you for a few weeks and you —”

"You’ve got Murphy!" She cries, "I had — there was a situation douchebag,"

"A situation," he deadpans.

"Yes,  _jesus Bellamy_ , just be fucking happy to see us why don’t you —”

"I  _would_  be if you weren’t bringing along all this baggage —”

“ _Baggage_ , you weren’t even there! I couldn’t just  _leave_  them!”

He huffs, “You and your  _ideals_  princess,”

"Hey, don’t start with that —"

"Bellamy!!" someone shouts, and Clarke moves to look only to be promptly bowled over by Jasper, "You’re alive!"

Jasper sweeps Bellamy into a hug, jostling the older man until Bellamy grunts out, “It’s good to see you too Jasper,”

Jasper lets go with a bright grin — sure,  _he_ doesn’t get  _sulked_  at, “We thought you were gone!”

Clarke lets out this deep exhale and tries not to sound too annoyed. Jasper amends, “Okay, well Clarke didn’t think so, but she didn’t think we’d find you in the middle of the forest either so we both are losers here,”

“ _Jasper_ ,”

"What," he grins, holding up his hands in the universal plea, "what, I’m just — it’s true."

Bellamy breaths out this chuckle, like he doesn’t  really mean to and Clarke says, “See, was that so hard?”

"Was it Jasper’s idea to bring the tag-alongs?" he replies, and Clarke’s returning scowl is the only answer he needs.

Miller is never that far from either her or Jasper, so it’s no surprise that he’s the next one to wade through the fray. He approaches Bellamy with an easy grin and grasps his shoulder.

"I’m glad you’re alive," Miller says.

Bellamy nods — what a  _shit_ , what, she’s going to call him General Dork, the Most Honourable Giant Nerd, he’s so pleased to have his second in command back that he can’t even grin like a  _real fucking human being_  he’s got to pretend to be stoic and,

Shit. It’s good to have him back.

"So," she walks up to him, careful to keep the swarm of happy-reunionees behind her lest Bellamy forget that he’s a big shit-head, "what’s next?"

—there’s more of course; like  _where the fuck have you been_ , and  _hey dude, glad I didn’t burn you alive_ , but for now it’s enough that Bellamy looks at her like he’s weighing his answers, sticks her back firmly in the place of  _leader_  without abandoning her to second-guessing her every whim; he’s here to do that for her.

"We’ve got to go back first," he says slowly, eyes steady on hers, "Raven is still on the ship."

The ship — “So there really are survivors?”

Bellamy’s face goes dark, so  _yeah_ , there are A.R.K. people back, fucking great, “Yeah. Raven’s with your mom.”

"What, how — I can’t," she stammers, and gulps because  _shit_ , “you left Raven with my  _mom_?”

"What else was I supposed to do —"

“ _Anything_  but leave Raven with my mother, c’mon Bellamy,”

"At least," he raises his voice, in that way that means he  _thinks_  he isn’t yelling but he definitely is, “at least I didn’t bring the enemy  _home_  with me,”

"No, you just left one of our people  _with_ the enemy!”

There’s a sigh off to the side — Clarke can barely hear it with the blood pounding behind her ears but, well, they’re in the middle of the fucking forest and they aren’t the smallest group of people at the moment, so — she turns.

Monty’s elbowing Jasper, lips quirked up, “It’s good to have the family together again, hey?”

Jasper nods, “Mom and Dad, back at last,”

Clarke’s face goes blank. Bellamy’s goes thunderous.

"Alright people," he hollers — this time in his  _I totally mean to be this charismatic I don’t practice these impromptu speeches at all_  voice, “we’re going to need to get moving if we want to make it back before dark,”

He levels one more glare at the group in general then storms back in the direction they came from. Clarke follows at a slower pace and watches him for all of three minutes as he huffs and shoots dirty looks at the Grounders — she really did need to bring them with her though, she’d  _literally_  blown up half their clan and was more or less responsible for Anya being stuck in there for god knows how long — before Bellamy caves and circles back to her.

His eyes linger on the group as they trudge past them — Finn’s leading the way, or Murphy technically, if you want to count the fact that no one is willing to let him out of their sight — and it’s fond, but also annoyed, but like, a  _happy_ annoyed, which she totally gets.

"Hey," she whispers suddenly, hearing the warmth in her voice and not bothering to worry about it, "it’s good to have you back."

He’s slowing his walk enough so that his strides aren’t much longer than hers, so she doesn’t begrudge the flippant, “Whatever princess,” that falls out of his mouth.

Besides, barely a second later and he reaches over to ruffle her hair, even though Clarke is firmly in the camp of  _non-hair rufflers_ , there’s a benefit to looking cool and collected most of the time, and admits, “I’m glad you’re not dead.”

“ _See_ , that’s,”

"Even," he interrupts, "if you make really bad fucking decisions."

"Shut _up_ ,”

And. Well.

It’s good to be back.


	8. what's mine is yours (apparently)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s not – it isn’t a sex thing. It could be, she thinks, but it isn’t. Which. Well, it’s wise – that it isn’t a sex thing means she can keep writing it off as some sort of…work thing. Leader thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one is inspired by the prompt: "Bellamy secretly loving it when Clarke is wearing his shirts + him saying “Goddammit, princess” whenever she does (◡‿◡✿)"
> 
> >> kind of. it’s kind of inspired by this  
> >> it’s sappy. sappier. ish. oh who knows, i’m drunk  
> >> super drunk  
> >> woooooooooooo  
> >> c’mon imagine clarke in huge bellamy pants, rolled up and belted in place and stormin’ some enemy camp, just DO IT  
> >> if this makes no sense…blame it on the ah-ah-ah-ah-ah-alcohol.

They escape, they escape and things change.

The days wear into weeks, the weeks into months, and gradually Clarke stops noticing some things. Like the way Raven shuffles her steps when she gets nervous, as if she’s lost confidence both in the weight of her statements and the weight of her torso on the fragile nerve endings in her leg. Or how Finn’s eyes get too wide at the sound of gunshots – whether real or imagined, the ones which come from the left-over cargo batches or the ones that come from dropped sheet metal and stone on flint. How Monty trails after someone, anyone, mostly Clarke but often Jasper, or Raven if he’s feeling particularly stranded. How Jasper, in turn, trails after Monty, how he sticks close to people who can reassure him of a situation’s validity, or the strength in his aim as it relates to the strength of his judgement.

Mostly, she forgets to notice Bellamy. Forgets to count the number of times he seeks her out in a day, and the number of times she seeks him out in the night.

It’s not – it isn’t a sex thing. It could be, she thinks, but it isn’t. Which. Well, it’s wise – that it isn’t a sex thing means she can keep writing it off as some sort of…work thing. Leader thing.

She finds herself in his tent more often than not – when they have tents, that is. Some treks they only have the stars as their company, and still she slowly routes herself during the day to a place at his side, bodies pressed together as they whisper of plans that have yet to come. During the day it’s a brief nod and a quick check-in…during the night, it’s debates and stories and promises, it’s everything she didn’t know she needed, but suddenly finds herself lost without.

It’s – it isn’t a sex thing. But it could be a love thing, which is probably a lot worse.

.

.

.

“The east wing?”

A pause. Then, “No, I think going from the southern side is smarter. Less chance for an air strike.”

She mulls over the map, splayed out in front of them as if there were ever a pretense of sleep – they may lie next to each other, a ploy to get everyone else to start gearing down, but they rarely pass out until a few hours later. The map itself marks cardinal directions and relative locations of camps, the ones they’ve found so far, and it’s Clarke’s version of a childhood blanket.

“If we go at night, then that’s true. But the guards will be tighter.” She points out.

Bellamy nods, presses closer to her underneath the blankets. The light of the campfire is just strong enough to show the basics of the diagram, so long as they’re both looking at it from the same spot.

“What if,” he says, threading an arm over hers, “we go at it from the west wing, but during the day?”

She tucks her feet under his shins, pulls the blanket tighter over her back. The nights are getting longer, the days shortening until they can only travel for maybe six hours at a time, and it’s way fucking colder than ever before. “Only if Raven agrees to go from the other side with a diversion.”

“One of Jasper’s bombs?”

“The harmless ones,” she amends, because they’re only trying to steal supplies, not lives, “with all the smoke.”

Bellamy shifts a little, until half is body is practically atop of hers – everyone else is asleep and they need to keep their voices at a whisper so as to not wake any of the younger kids nearby. Whenever they lack basic amenities whilst travelling – tents, blankets, any semblance of covering – the children take to curling up near their space. Clarke can feel bony elbows near her knee and she knows that they aren’t Bellamy’s; more likely Aspen has shoved herself into the pocket of warmth there.

“Yeah, okay.”

Clarke moves, shoves her hands under Bellamy’s shirt because he’s a fucking furnace and her fingers are icicles, and murmurs over the sound of his hiss, “Will Jasper be okay with that?”

He nods. “Raven’s been building them with him, so I think he’ll be fine.”

“Okay.”

“And,” he whispers, “Li has some new weapons fixed from our last raid, the one near the river?” Clarke nods. “Those are useable.”

“It’ll be an hour, tops, in and out.”

He reaches out to fold the map, because it’s almost sunrise surely.

“Do you want to go this time or wait back here?” He asks.

The last raid they’d done Clarke had the ‘blessing’ of dealing with burns and scrapes, hardly worth the medical training she’d been building along their travels. She takes the documents when he shoves them in her directions, both of their heads resting on the rocky forest floor.

“I think I’ll go this time,” she says, tucking the paper into the front of her pants, where she’s at least certain it’ll remain until morning, “let you deal with being the one who waits at home.”

He grins – she can tell, even in the fading fire-light, because he’s got the whitest fucking teeth for someone who’s been without toothpaste for years now. Something to do with the fruit peels Monty brings around. “Deal. I’ll stay at home with the kids, you bring back the loot.”

It’s…it’s a joke – totally a joke, but one that makes her feel oddly soft on the inside, which is all sorts of bad and good in one confused feeling. Confused but  _welcomed_  feeling.

“’Kay,” she says, then curls the blanket over her shoulder, tucking herself under his body.

“First thing in the morning,” he murmurs, and lets her shove her face into the crook of his neck, where the heat is the warmest – Clarke always runs a bit colder than normal, even on good days.

And well – if she wakes up pressed tightly to his chest, fingers clenched into the fabric of his shirt, so be it. His arms drape across her back and they burrow into each other, the smartest method to preserve body heat. It’s – logical, definitely logical.

At least, that’s what she keeps telling herself, even as she nicks one of his sweaters and holds the memento close to her heart, gun in hand and scrimmage in the forefront of her mind.

.

.

.

She returns covered in blood or smoke or, once, half a mountain-worth of mud, and she always wears his jacket when she does. No one questions it, not even Bellamy – if you ignore the way he quirks an eyebrow in her direction, or swears  _god damnit princess_  under his breath, in that fond tone she knows to mean that she can continue doing it. She feels better going out on these missions with a piece of him on her, and she tells herself it’s just because they’ve lost each other before, she’s always worn mementos when she leaves whatever home she’s got at that moment, and this is just another one to tack on. She tells herself this is normal, her version of normal, and so she doesn’t need to think about it too much.

Like, she wears Raven’s necklace when she goes out, Monty’s socks and Jasper’s goggles, sometimes at least. And always something of Bellamy’s, because he’s the other her in camp, so it’s the most important.

Clarke’s a rational human being. She isn’t about to question a clearly perfunctory working system. Not even when Bellamy steals her drawings, or when it’s easier to find them together then apart. They’ve got a camp to run and kids to raise and supplies to steal.

(And if Sterling comes up to her wanting to talk about  _what do I do, I think Sauna_ and _Timber are really, really attractive, especially together_ , or Pepper approaches her with problems to do with way too many nightmares and not nearly enough remedies, then, if she happens to need a few more of Bellamy’s things to deal with it – shirts, jackets, sometimes even his pants, which is both awkward and comforting – then, well, that’s all there is to it.)


End file.
